Paint Away Those Tired Words

Here is an easy mini lesson on word choice that I did this year with my class AND it tied in with a current lesson they were having in art class. After the students were discussing colors and hues in art class, I brought in a stack of paint chips.

Source: flickr.com via Kitty on Pinterest

Using the paint chip I wrote the word fun on the lightest color.  Together we brainstormed words that could replace "fun" and ranked them in order until we got to the boldest color and boldest word.

I partnered students up, handed out paint chips, some tired words and a thesaurus and the students went to town.  Soon our door was covered in colorful paint chips with student made signs reminding them to pick a bolder word and other clever sayings.  After a few weeks, we attached all of the chips with a word ring and hung them up in the writing station.

Later in the year when they were partner revising their Young Author's Books, I heard more than one child say, "I think you could use a bolder word here," and they would run off to the chips! 

Here is a sampling of some of the phrases the kids came up to display our paint chips.  They created their own signs by hand and I wish I had taken pictures of the whole darn thing....but I didn't!

Bold Words










While searching Pinterest for a picture of paint chips, I came across some other cool uses.  Check these out:

Source: karrie-gull.blogspot.com via Kitty on Pinterest

How fun would these be to make?

Source: readingresource.net via Tara on Pinterest

So colorful!

Source: firstgraderatlast.blogspot.com via Elisa on Pinterest

Make some jazzy Elkonin boxes.  Reading Rockets has a great tutorial for this.

Source: howaboutorange.blogspot.com via Paula on Pinterest

I can picture bookmarks with reading strategies or icons printed on them.  You could use clear address labels to print your strategy so the color would remain.

You can get paint chips for free, but if you are like me you feel a little guilty taking a class set.  I had a conversation with my nice Benjamin Moore dealer and he gave me a whole pack of chips they didn't display because one or two of colors are discontinued.  Don't be afraid to ask!

Have you ever used paint chips in the classroom?

My Not Weird School

I mentioned yesterday that Dan Gutman will be coming to our school for our Young Author's Day.  Usually our author comes in the spring, but Dan was available in early October so we jumped at the chance.  The downside is that everyone will be crazy busy with back-to-school.  But I have a few tricks up my sleeve:

• I have encouraged everyone to make their back-to-school bulletin board do double duty as their author bulletin board.  To emulate Gutman's My Weird School series teachers can create a board rhyming their name.   So if your name is Mrs. Fry your board might say:  Mrs. Fry's Class is Soaring High....and you might have a hot air balloon with the name of each student. 
• We always create a board in our lobby with pictures of the entire staff to help new families on back-to school-night.  Title of this board?  The Not Weird Teachers of (Insert school name here).
• In honor of Gutman's Million Dollar series I'm thinking of labeling The Million Dollar Office, The Million Dollar Water Fountain or The Million Dollar Lunch Room.

Do your students love The Weird School Series?  Listed below is a pdf Teacher's Guide. 

Teacher's Guide for Weird School Series

You can find this and other fun things at Dan Gutman's website.

What types of activities have you done for Young Author's Day or Author's Visit.  Let me know!

Give Me a Quack

Rebecca at Create*Teach*Share is hosting a Linky Party about the use of Post-its in the classroom.  She is giving away a boat-load of Post-its, and who doesn't need Post-its?

Win this!!

I wanted to create an authentic purpose and audience for my second grade beginning writers.  I had spent the summer learning about Twitter and Facebook and thought it would be neat if the kids could have some way to express themselves and have others react but I knew we didn't have the technology or permission to put our kiddos on Twitter. Hence...Quacker was born  hatched.

I created an interactive board outside of my classroom door attaching paper and border using a hot glue gun.  :$ 

I slipped a Post-it pad on the top and Velcroed a marker to the wall.  I wrote the first post to get everyone started and sent an email to the staff encouraging them and their kids to leave us a note.



I also posted a reminder to encourage more participation.



My second grade students loved returning from lunch and special each day to read the quacks. Our principal and our superintendent left a Quack and the kids felt like they were famous!

It was a wonderful springboard for Writer's Workshop.  I encouraged my reluctant writers to "Quack."  Once their Quack was on the board I would have a staff member or former student respond to their Quack with a question or comment.  Soon, they had a mini conversation that very easily turned into a personal narrative. 

Low tech, low budget, but high on function.  Have you Quacked today?